Nevertheless, our findings support previously published works in lytic and latent infection establishing a role for regulation of Akt signaling as well as the requirement of Akt attenuation to allow for FOXO3a activation and IE gene expression, modelling for the first time a mechanism employed by HCMV miRNAs to regulate Akt during reactivation. Here, AKT1 is linked to disease arising from reactivation of latent virus.